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The College Board's website says in many different places that the best way to prepare for the test is to do well in school:
"Keep in mind that the foundation of a student's SAT and college preparation is a rigorous curriculum of English, mathematics, science, history, and other academic subjects. Students should read extensively and develop good writing skills."
Ok, I'm in. I buy that; I want that for my children.
My question is, are schools really teaching this rigorous academic curriculum that the college board says is the best prep for the test (and college too)?
Erica Meltzer has written extensively about what she sees in her practice as a tutor:
"I'd also like to suggest that there are some very important skills that many high school students need to be taught explicitly in order to master, and that high schools -- even very good ones -- are routinely failing to teach.
Chief among these skills is the ability to engage with a text word by word, paying close attention to elements such as diction, syntax, and structure in order to fully comprehend the particular idea that an author is attempting to convey -- not just glancing over a book (or Sparknotes, for that matter) and getting a vague notion about what an author *might* be saying. Working with this level of precision requires an extraordinarily high level of concentration. It also requires that students temporarily put themselves aside and focus exclusively on someone else's intentions -- not, I gather, something that they are routinely asked to do."
I took my son's 10th grade PSAT the other day, and found myself aghast (again) at how darn hard this test is. I'm not opposed to rigor, by the way; just wondering if our schools are on the same page.
There were passages dealing with Descartes, dualism, genomes, and neuroscience! Students had to compare two passages that were extremely sophisticated, with both authors agreeing on the main point, but from different perspectives, and their distinctions were subtle.
To give you some idea of what I'm talking about, take a look at this final paragraph from Passage 1 and a few of the questions.
Not easy.......
Illustration by Jennifer Orlkin Lewis
Copyright Debbie Stier
